23 Months

As of tomorrow, big boy Will is 23 months old! As always, we've had a busy week since our last post. Will has continued his learning streak and he can now identify almost all of the letters of the alphabet! He actually points to each letter and correctly says each one in his little munchkin voice. He doesn't get them right 100% of the time but the only letter he hasn't identified yet is "V." The letters he occasionally gets wrong are ones that can easily be confused for other letters. For example, he sometimes confuses "R" and "K," "M" and "W" and sometimes he calls the letter "L" a "seven." Other than that, he's pretty consistent about knowing his letters! Not bad for not even two years old! He can identify all numbers 2 through 9 but has some trouble with 1 and 10. When he sees the number "10" he says "O" because he focuses on the zero. I'm struggling with how to explain the difference between circles, ovals, the letter "O" and the number zero.

Even more impressively, Will "sees" letters in objects and will point them out to us. For example, last week he had an oval train track set up in the kitchen. He stood above it for a while and then said "O." I said, "That's right- it looks like the letter O." Then he picked up the track and pulled off a couple of the pieces and said "C" because it was then in the shape of a C. Then he turned the C sideways and said "U." I couldn't believe he was making letters out of his train tracks! Such a smart little boy! He loves finding letters when we are out and about and he's always very excited when he gets them right. We were in Hobby Lobby last week and I was showing him the large wooden letters for arts and crafts. After he'd identify each letter he'd say "good job." I realized that I always say "good job" after he correctly identifies letters- so he started telling himself "good job." He'd say "D- good job", then "A- good job." It was pretty funny. Then a couple of days ago we were using his sidewalk chalk on the back patio and he started scribbling on the concrete then he'd point to his scribbles and say "what's that." When I draw letters, shapes or numbers for him I point to them and ask him "what's that." So I guess he thought it was his turn to quiz me. I wasn't nearly as good at identifying what he was drawing.

Will still is not the most talkative little guy but he's getting much more communicative and easier to understand. He is able to understand and answer most of our questions- though he seems to have a predisposition to answering everything "no." He has also learned the word "mine" and is not afraid to use it. Today in the grocery store he was telling people "hi," "sorry" and "thank you." Though not always at appropriate times in the case of the last two. Will also had a very good memory for places. When we pass Wilford Hall Medical Center, he says "doctor" because he knows that's where we go to see the doctor. When we pull up in front of David's office, he yells "Daddy!". And not long ago after church when we went to one of our favorite Mexican restaurants, he walked right in and went to the area we usually sit in. He never ceases to amaze us!

We have had a couple of challenges this week, however. We used to be able to set a clock by Will's schedule. For several months he's been up at 7:00, napping at 1:00 and in bed by 7:30. He was a good eater too, right on schedule. Over the last few weeks, however, he has been increasingly unpredictable. He started pushing back his wake-up time and is now usually getting up between 7:30 and 8:00. He refuses to nap before 2:00 or 2:30 and even then sometimes he won't go to sleep. Then he doesn't want to go to bed until 8:00. Even when we put him in bed, he stays awake sometimes until 9:00 or 9:30. Normally, we would just follow his lead and alter his sleep schedule, but it seems to be causing problems. He used to wake up from his afternoon naps happy and playful. Now he wakes up close to dinner time a complete grouch! He wakes up crying and clingy and there's nothing we can do to make him happy until he calms down after half and hour or so. It makes dinner challenging. I've been trying to give him snacks before nap time so that he's not starving but he just doesn't eat much nowadays. It's taking us a while to find our new rhythm but we'll get there.

Despite not eating much he still seems to be growing like a weed. He seems to get taller every week. The Cars jammies in the picture below fit not too long ago. Now the top seems to be a belly shirt- and it's a size 3T! Speaking of the movie Cars, Will has a little attachment to two toy vehicles from the Cars movie that we got him at the Disney Store a couple of months back. One is a fire truck and the other is an old Army Jeep called "Sarge." He is particularly attached to "Sarge" and takes it to bed with him, to his high chair for meals and with him when we leave the house. He very clearly calls it "Sarge" and when he accidently drops it out of his reach, Will lets out an anguished "Saaaaaarge." It's pretty hilarious!

Will is also working on his jump shot. He used to just dunk on his basketball goal but now he stands about a foot in front and tries to shoot while jumping. It usually ends up being a little jump and then shooting but he's trying! Other activities Will has enjoyed this week include more of an interest in reading books and "cooking" in the kitchen. He likes to play with his pretend food. He pretends to cook and then he sits at the table and pretends to eat. One day, when I needed to buy some time so I could make dinner, I put some mixing bowls with water on the floor and gave him measuring cups, funnels and spatulas. He ended up soaked but he had a blast "cooking." And it bought me 25 minutes of uninterrupted time- so worth it!

Sometimes I think Will must be learning that it's normal to visit the doctor at least once a week. Between Will's recent illness, his skin, my pregnancy and my thyroid monitoring, we seem to be at the hospital at least once a week. He is usually very cooperative though. This morning I had my 28-week OB appointment. Everything is completely normal and on schedule so far. My gestational diabetes screening was normal and everything seems to be going well. Still on schedule for a c-section the week of June 22nd. Crossing our fingers everything remains on track!